Canadian Police Urge Citizens to Report ‘Online Hate’ as Free Speech Crackdown Accelerates
by Frank Bergman
Canadian authorities are escalating efforts to police speech on social media as the federal government expands its definition of “hate,” “violence,” and “extremism.”
The latest warning came from Edmonton Police, which urged citizens to report allegedly “hateful” online comments in a post that was quickly deleted following public backlash.
“You typed it. Someone lived it,” the police message stated.
“Online hate isn’t ‘just a comment.’
“It hurts real people and harms real communities.
“Hate has no home here.”
The post included a video presenting examples of comments that police suggested should be reported.
However, lawmakers and legal commentators warned that many of the examples appeared offensive rather than criminal, exposing how easily hate-speech enforcement can be used to intimidate Canadians into silence.
Police Delete ‘Report Online Hate’ Campaign After Backlash
The Edmonton Police post directed users to a page where they could report social media content to authorities.
The department deleted the campaign after it triggered immediate criticism.
Conservative MP Andrew Lawton said some of the examples shown in the video could potentially cross the legal line by advocating violence.
However, he warned that most appeared to fall short of Canada’s criminal standard for hate speech.
“Some of these posts call for violence and could meet criminal threshold, but I struggle to see how most of these sample hate posts would be illegal (which is different from offensive, hurtful, uncivil, etc.),” Lawton wrote.
“This is precisely the chilling effect I warned about with Bill C-9.”
Bill C-9, the Liberal government’s Combatting Hate Act, dramatically expanded Canada’s hate-speech regime while removing safeguards that previously constrained prosecutions.